


Each Merrily Goes

by Allekha



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Ballet, F/M, Falling In Love, First Meetings, Ice Skating, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-10-24 08:34:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17701010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Allekha/pseuds/Allekha
Summary: Lilia's first meeting with Yakov was not love at first sight.That love, the first time and the second, came through many meetings, and many conversations about ballet, and working together, and skating.





	Each Merrily Goes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [elstaplador](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elstaplador/gifts).



Victor asked her, once, as a wide-eyed adolescent, how she met Yakov, no doubt expecting some romantic story. That she'd somehow noticed him in the audience from her stage, or that she had been enchanted with his skating, or he had helped her in the streets, or decided to give a lonely-looking woman flowers.

The story, to his disappointment, was not romantic at all: they had met at a very boring party when someone tripped and knocked into Yakov, who in turn tripped and spilled his glass of wine all over Lilia's dress.

It was not love at first sight. She had stared at her dress; he had been very apologetic.

He had then taken his actions a step beyond the usual kind of apology a man might give a pretty woman he had just spilled wine on, and offered to help wash the stains out.

So Lilia found herself sitting in the men's washroom in her slip and Yakov's jacket, watching as he carefully rinsed the front of her dress in the sink. It was rather cold, but truthfully she was thankful that she was no longer being forced to listen to dreadfully boring conversation, though she did hope that the wine washed out. She liked that dress. (Lilia did not own clothes she did not like.)

"I don't believe I heard your name," she said after a few minutes of this. There was not a lot of entertainment to be had in watching someone rinsing fabric.

"Yakov Feltsman." As he wrung her dress out, he looked at her, first in the mirror, and then by turning his head.

The name meant nothing to her. "And you are a...." A dancer? He didn't quite have the body type for ballet, but there was something of the quality to him, she thought.

"A figure skater. I won bronze at Worlds." That sounded important enough; that was probably why he'd been invited, if not through some other connection. Lilia had some vague idea that figure skating was a pretty sport, as far as sports went, and that Russia was good at it. Maybe she'd seen some of the last Olympics, or maybe she'd been too busy. "And you are Miss Lilia Baranovskaya, soloist at the Bolshoi."

She tilted her head in acknowledgment; so he liked ballet.

He coughed and turned back to her dress. "I saw you perform last month. In _The Tale of the Stone Flower_." There were still faint pink stains on the fabric, so he put the dress under the running water again. "Your performance was very beautiful," which was the sort of compliment that Lilia was used to hearing. Of course he had to saying something like that, _lovely, graceful, passionate, beautiful_. But he continued: "It was difficult to look away. You struck me as extremely strong."

 _Strong_ was not the usual compliment. _Explosive_ , for the good jumpers, perhaps. "That's not something one hears every day. Usually we try to make the audience think everything happens like magic."

He snorted. "I've been taking lessons since I was six. I'm not good at it, but I know that it's difficult to dance the way you do, and then to make it look flawless and effortless – in front of an audience – takes even more strength. Of body and of will. You had a powerful presence on the stage."

"Thank you," she said. "Is figure skating so different?"

She liked the way he smiled, just a little, the way it softened the edges of his face. "You only need to jump over and over in a few minutes – two turns in the air, sometimes three – and then land on a thin piece of steel. And try to dance a little in between." 

"Without falling over." Lilia had never been skating, but she'd seen children trying to toddle along on public rinks, adults clinging to their friends who had better balance as they tried to figure out how to move on ice, on knives tacked to boots. It seemed a bit absurd, but then, Lilia spent hours every week dancing on her toes in reinforced slippers.

He smiled further, then held her dress up to the light again. He must have been satisfied with how it looked, because he began to wring it out in earnest. "That is the ideal. Skate softly, with high jumps. I take ballet for a reason. But it's nice to see it done properly when I have the time."

She took the dress when he handed it over, and he politely turned away as she pulled it back on. He'd done a good job of squeezing the water out, and she couldn't see any stains. It was damp, but it was summer. Hopefully it would dry quickly. As he pulled his jacket over his shoulders, she fiddled with her scarf to cover some of the dress until it looked as good as it was going to get for now.

He apologized again as they stepped out of the room. "The dress is fine," she said, "and you gave me a few minutes of escape from listening to gossip." Horridly dull gossip, at that. "Thank you for your assistance." 

Yakov was called over by someone as soon as they were back in the party; Lilia found herself another glass of wine (at least that much was decent) and stood in a corner with two of her friends, listening to them gossip as well, this time about ballet politics. It was only mildly more interesting than the previous gossip. She might have preferred to continue talking in the cold bathroom about ballet. 

~!~

She crossed paths with Yakov every once in a while. At this party along with his coach, at that event. She found that he was more passionate, and more interesting, when he wasn't flustered about wine on her dress.

He'd seen more ballet performances than she would have thought, and he could speak the language. It wasn't like talking to some politicians eager to show off how cultured they were, who could usually name _Swan Lake_ and _The Nutcracker_ and perhaps, if she was lucky, a third ballet that they had seen once.

Yakov did not try to show off how cultured he was. He didn't gush over how pretty she was when he'd seen her in another performance since the last time they'd met, though he did like to praise her jumps and her hands. He didn't flirt incessantly with her as the young, popular ballerina, or shyly try to keep her attention.

It was nice.

They talked about ballet, of course, their main shared interest, but sometimes they wandered off into other subjects. Usually art. Literature, the paintings in whatever space they were in, music. Occasionally even figure skating. He wasn't afraid to disagree with her, but she didn't have to square her shoulders to make sure he didn't try to trample all over her opinions, either.

He was handsome enough, so when he did make a suggestion here and there, she found it fun to flirt back – to take sips of wine from his glass and to set her eyelids just so and to subtly adjust the hem of her skirt.

There was one night where they slipped off alone together – it was getting towards the end of summer. The night was chilly and damp when they retreated to the open balcony, in order to hear each other above the din of a dozen other voices. Lilia was tired from rehearsals, and she was tired of ballet politics. They could make her a principal in two years, they could praise her talents, but they wouldn't send her abroad to tour.

She wanted to dance in Paris so badly that her bones ached for it. She wanted to see the audiences in New York and Tokyo, to show them what her ballet was like.

It was all very tiresome. But she would get her way eventually. For now, she sat with Yakov. Nestled between the edge of the balcony and a large pot of flowers that blocked them off further from all the noise, she was glad to listen to him talk about skating for a while, even when she had no idea who he was talking about.

The Olympics were next year; they were clearly on his mind, especially when he mentioned that he was working on his new program. "My coach is trying a new choreographer," he said. "He says my artistic scores need to be higher to try for a medal. I like the music, but the program – I don't know. Something about it feels off to me."

"If it feels off, you won't be able to perform it properly. If your heart isn't in it, there will be no beauty or art present," she said. "Ask about it."

"I tried. I can't explain what it is, though. It's not that it doesn't match the music."

On a whim, she said, "Let me take a look at it."

He went from frowning off into the distance to blinking at her. "Are you sure? You must be very busy."

"I am. I will find time. It does no artist any good to not try something new once in a while, and it is for the sake of the Soviet Union's medal chances." Besides, she was a little bored with just dancing, as much as she found joy in it. It would be good to see this other form of art and come back to hers with, perhaps, a bit of new perspective and inspiration. And she wanted to try choreography. Lilia dreamed of new dances that she couldn't wait to put on a stage, but she had to begin somewhere.

"I would appreciate it," he said, and then he frowned again when she shivered as a breeze passed. "Do you want to head inside? You seem cold."

Of course she was chilled. She was wearing a thin dress and sitting on a stone bench on a chilly night. She did not want to go back inside and listen to tedious people, even if that might be more productive for her career. "I am, but here is fine," she said, and she solved the problem by scooting over until she was pressed against Yakov's side. He was quite warm, and he provided more shelter from the breeze.

He coughed, and did not move away.

"Tell me about your schedule," she said. "And what is the music?"

They talked about it for a few minutes more, but Yakov's heart wasn't in it; he kept looking at her. "You still look cold," he said, when they could say no more about ice and rehearsal schedules.

Lilia took it as an invitation rather than an excuse. There was still nobody else on the balcony when she glanced to the side. "Perhaps you should help me first, then," she said, and leaned up.

His mouth was very warm, and so was his arm when he draped it around her. The slight scratch of stubble against her cheek was irritating, but she liked the way he kissed. Not too much pressure, not too much tongue, no teeth biting at her.

They kissed a second time, and a third, and then she swung herself into his lap and kissed him again. He didn't have a dancer's hands, but he had wide ones, hot where they pressed against her back and her waist. She liked the feel of them. She liked the way her breath came faster the more they kissed. This was much better than whatever insipid conversation awaited them inside, though they would have to return to it eventually.

"Is this warm enough?" he murmured, pressing his lips to her neck. She could barely hear the words, though the touch made her shiver.

"Yes," she said, trying to catch her breath. She was proud of her long neck, and Yakov seemed to appreciate it, too, kissing it softly.

She took one of his hands and placed it at the hem of her skirt. Drew her own hands down his chest and wished, for a moment, that they had the opportunity to do this properly. In the future. She was curious what skaters looked like, and she could feel the muscle underneath.

Her hands dropped further. His slipped up her skirt. It was hot on their bench, just the two of them.

There were many things Lilia wanted – she wanted the role of Odette and Odile the next time the Bolshoi put on _Swan Lake_ , and she wanted the chance to travel and perform and see new cities off the stage, and she wanted opportunities to learn how to produce choreography, and she wanted recognition for all of her work and her talents.

They would come. She was patient, and she was stubborn. They would. At least this one thing she wanted tonight, she did not have to wait for.

~!~

Hardly any time passed before she saw him again, or so it felt like, given how long it usually went between when they met by chance.

She wore her best coat, and she walked into the rink beside Yakov as though it wasn't unusual for her to be there at all. Still, her appearance caught the attention of his coach. "Yasha! What's with the visitor today?"

He looked at her like she was just some girl Yakov wanted to impress. She couldn't abide it. Lilia was not very tall, but there were ways of getting around that. She approached his coach with a straight back and the walk that had the younger dancers falling over themselves to get out of her way. "I am Lilia Baranovskaya," she said, looking him straight in the eye. "I am a principal dancer at the Bolshoi, and I am here to assist him with his choreography." _Do not interrupt us._

He let her walk to the side of the rink without further comment. (To her; she heard whispering with Yakov. But if he was in any trouble, it didn't show when he came out on the ice.)

Somebody played the music for them, and Yakov skated. So this was what it was like. It was different from her imagination, which had held vague images of ballet positions and jetés and spins. There were quite a lot of jumps, in fact. And she was a little jealous of how easy the spins looked on the ice, some of them so fast that he couldn't spot them. 

She could also tell that this was going to be quite a different challenge than she had expected. There was a three-dimensional element to the stage, but not like this, with an audience on all sides who had to be considered. And of course she didn't know what any of the skating steps were called. But Yakov would help her, and they would figure it out. She could see many areas to improve already.

It was tempting to start rattling them off when Yakov came over to ask for her opinion. But she was here to help, not show off or intimidate, and that would not be helpful. 

She told him that she had liked the one piece of choreography near the middle, and the timing of his penultimate spin had matched the music well. The rest of it.... 

"Do you need to hold your arms out so much?" she asked. "It makes you look very stiff. And you need to bend your knees more."

"My coach always says that," Yakov said.

"And do there need to be so many of the little steps? They are too light for the music. You need more drama. Of course the choreography feels off – this music demands commitment, and you cannot commit yourself to it with movements that are designed to be half-hearted."

Yakov's mouth turned up. Despite the difficulties, it was interesting to work with him, though she wished he wouldn't talk back so much. Perhaps it was because they were almost the same age, rather than her being the older teacher, or perhaps skating culture was different.

He taught her the names of the skating elements when she needed him – that an arabesque was a spiral, that the movement like fourth position was an Ina Bauer. She told him to curve his spine more when he did his and found the new image pleasing.

The session passed quickly. Lilia tried to find time to make more of them, though it was difficult with her schedule, and there were not many she could come to. Still, Yakov improved at each one, and between every time she saw him. His movements became more fluid, more natural, and by the time Lilia was satisfied with the choreography, they had re-done a good chunk of the program, adding drama and motion. 

He did not have a dancer's grace. It was true that artistry didn't seem to come to him as easily as it had come to her, and he needed reminders about his hands. But when he had a good run-through, Lilia enjoyed it. She did not believe in only one standard of beauty.

They broke off the sessions when it seemed that they had made enough changes, and that Yakov simply needed to keep practicing his movements and his jumps, and when Lilia's schedule grew more crowded. Yakov thanked her with a home-made dinner that she lingered over, and with kisses that tasted like good wine.

The work had been good for her, too, she thought. It was a new way to think, and she came back to her own stage every time with a touch more focus, ruthlessly perfecting her movements the same way she was helping Yakov perfect his. 

~!~

She was not able to see him for a while before the Olympics. She was busy enough, and presumably so was he. There were nights when she missed him, though, when her feet ached from her pointe shoes and her muscles were strained from a long day of dance, dance, dance. Like any dancer, she could hide the pain and exhaustion, but she wondered if he would have seen it anyway.

Skaters were probably the same way. All those jumps, five minutes of performance, while balancing over a thin blade on slippery ice. But an audience demanded.

She read about the results of the compulsory figures in the paper, with Yakov placed near the top. (He'd shown her some, one day, when she hadn't known what he was referring to. She hadn't realized figure skating involved figures, and to her it seemed like the difference between barre exercises and a true performance.)

Several of Lilia's friends were more interested in sport than she was; they made a small event out of watching the skating when it was on. Lilia only came to watch the men, sitting around the television in one's apartment and critiquing the performances, duly cheering on their countrymen.

When Yakov came out, Lilia tucked her legs closer and leaned forward. The view of the camera was not the same as the view in the rink, but the blurry image would do.

The familiar music started, and Yakov began to skate. Still a little stiff in the knees, but softer than he had been, and his arms were much better. He remembered his hands; he arched his back a little in the Ina Bauer; he glided smoothly, as though skating was the easiest thing in the world.

And he landed his jumps. Two triple salchows, several double axels with spectacular distance, jump after jump – and his spins, too. Not the best they'd seen all night, but they looked nice, and they mostly stayed where they began.

When the music ended, Yakov's smile almost burst from his face, and it went straight to Lilia's heart.

He had been beautiful.

"Sixes!" cried one of the other dancers. "Give him sixes, damn you."

"He was amazing," said Lilia's friend, next to her. "I – Lilia, are you crying?"

She was. She hastened to dab the tears away with a tissue. Seeing Yakov perform like that, carrying through the choreography that they had worked on, looking at ease with his abilities – yes. It struck her.

"That's how you know it's a good one," someone pronounced.

The evening ended with Yakov beaming on the podium – bronze, to their complaints, but apparently the difference in scores had been down to figures. Supposedly. Lilia didn't understand how the scoring worked. She only knew which one her favorite had been.

Lilia was not able to see him for a while after the Olympics, either, but finally she had enough of waiting to meet him, and found a gap in one evening to venture to his rink.

By the time she arrived, he was unlacing his boots. There was shock on his face when he saw her, first, and then the same smile he'd given after his free skate, and then his coach stepped in front of her. He was smiling, too, though not so handsomely, as he praised her work with Yakov, thanking her for her time.

Yakov insisted on walking her home. It was dark, after all, and winter still clung to the city. Wrapped in their layers of clothing, they could have been any couple walking down the streets.

"I was nervous before the free skate," he admitted. "I was thinking too much about the medals, about disappointing my coach, about disappointing you if you saw it – after all the work – and then I thought, Lilia would go out there and skate the most beautiful performance even if she was shaking with nerves. Although I don't know if you ever get butterflies."

"Only a little." When she danced a new role for the first time, usually. "They go away as soon as I emerge on the stage. You have to be the swan, or the princess, or the fairy. There is no other way to do it."

"You have to have confidence in yourself, and in the dance?"

"Yes."

"That's what I thought. That this was the best program I could have, given to me by the choreographer and Lilia, that I'd worked on for so long. And then I skated. It felt like I was floating the whole time. Afterward, I couldn't believe I hadn't fallen."

"It was the program of the night," Lilia declared. "It was lovely."

"I don't know about _lovely_."

It was true that the newspaper had used other words. _Powerful. Strong. Effortless_. "It was lovely," she said. "You showed your true strength, you embodied the program, and you gave the great lie of all dance – you made it look as though it were nothing. You made use of your body from your shoulders to your knees to your fingertips to express yourself. You skated with joy. What else should I call it?"

Yakov was silent for a minute, and as they turned on to a quieter street, he let out a long breath. "The program did make me happy. When I was skating it, I thought of you and the times we worked on it together. All the comments you kept making. How much we both put into it."

"I could see," she said, and when the noise of their footsteps on the street echoed too much in her ears, she made an admission of her own: "I wanted to see you earlier."

"I did, too." He caught her shoulder, and for a moment they looked at each other. He wasn't as handsome as some of his competitors had been, perhaps, but she liked his strong jaw and the way his hair fell around his face, and his eyes when he looked at her. There was some of the softness there, too, in the middle of his hard features. "May I ask you something?"

"Yes," she said, and she said it again not a minute later.

~!~

Many years later, when she moved back to St. Petersburg, Lilia didn't hesitate to order Yakov to move in with her again; anything for the sake of her students. She never did things by half-measures. She did wonder, though, the first few nights, if they would fall into their previous bad habits and arguments.

But the years apart made some of those old resentments – small ones, but still irritating – seem silly. And perhaps Yakov felt it, too. They still bickered, but not as much as before. He took his time to slot the dishes back into her organized shelves properly without complaining, and she didn't try to re-arrange his books as long as they were put away.

Yuri was much more the problem. He could cook, it turned out, but nobody had ever taught the child how to _clean_. Honestly. At least Victor had been naturally neat, and happy enough to try new chores as long as he got their attention afterward.

They made it through one chaotic year, and they made it through the next. It was better in some ways, because there was none of this coming and going from Victor or dramatic crying on the ice from Georgi, and worse in most others, because it was an Olympic year. Lilia had weathered enough of them to know how the pressure and the attention drove everyone a little crazy.

After the end of the season, they unwound by going to a ballet together and grousing about the lead ballerina's technique the whole ride back. At home, Lilia made tea for two, and they sat in the kitchen, sipping it and looking at the flowers Victor had brought to make his retirement official.

On occasion, Lilia missed the quiet of living by herself. But it was quiet enough with Yuri shuffled home to his grandfather for a few weeks, and it was nice to have someone else to make dinner and drink tea with again. Nice to have _Yakov_ to make dinner, since he hadn't lost any of his cooking skills. It wasn't the old days, when she might put her head on his shoulder, or he would kiss the part of her hair when he was in a good mood, but it didn't need to be the old days.

(Though there were nights, laying in bed and sliding her fingers up her thighs, when she did miss the touch. The sex had always been good, until their arguments had started to carry over into the bedroom. It probably would still be good. His hands were rougher than they had been on that long-ago night he'd washed wine from her dress, but not much different than they had been a decade ago. She might have asked him, if she'd been sure about whether it was a good idea.)

If Yakov missed Victor, despite all his complaining, if the flowers stirred a deep affection in his heart that was saddened by the end of Victor's long career with him, it probably didn't last. Victor was back in the rink a week later, all abuzz with ideas for Yuuri's programs next season, bringing her a front-row ticket to the ice show he was hosting later in the spring.

To her left at the show was Minako Okukawa. (She had done a wonderful job with Yuuri, though his natural talents had to have helped. If only he'd stayed on the stage, Lilia had thought more than once in their lessons. He would have been a sensation.) She would have expected Yakov to be seated to her right, but that seat went to Yuri's grandfather instead.

At first, she thought Yakov must have been seated elsewhere, or else not at the show at all. He saw enough skating in his life. But then a new skater came out, and she could recognize him even in the darkness, even before the announcer said his name.

When was the last time _Yakov_ had been in an _ice show_? (How on Earth had Victor talked him into it?)

He looked right at her as the song started. It was a very, very familiar one, not classical, slow and calm – a song that she and Yakov had fallen in love with years and years ago. She still had the record, though like anyone sensible, nowadays she mostly listened to it in digital format.

Yakov was still never going to be mistaken for a dancer. But his knees weren't stiff, and she could tell he was enjoying himself; that was a real smile on his face as he swept smoothly from one side of the ice to the other, his blades quieter on the ice than those of the young girl who had skated before him. His choreography was organic, and the way he performed it, it was as though he'd simply decided to dance to a song coming on the radio.

He even still had his jumps. At least a couple of them, as singles. The crowd clapped for them, if not quite as enthusiastically as they had for the more difficult ones by earlier skaters.

He ended the program with an Ina Bauer – back curved nicely, just as she had told him all those decades ago – before he pivoted into a last pose. Lilia met his eyes again as the audience clapped. There was something in that gaze, in the program, a message meant only for her. A shared acknowledgment of their past, she thought. Perhaps even of their future. Something in her chest stirred.

She rose and dropped her bag on her seat in one smooth movement, so she could applaud properly.

"It was beautiful," she told him afterward, to which he sighed and went to put the kettle on. "Not in the same way Vitya's was, or Yuuri's," she gave, "but it was. You moved more confidently on your skates than anyone, and your connection to the music was undeniable. It did not need ballet lines to be beautiful. Who did the choreography? Vitya?"

"I did," he said, gathering two of her tea cups and bringing them to the table. Some of her shock must have been on her face (Yakov? Choreography? He'd never choreographed a program in his career!), given the way he smiled. "I'm old enough that I thought I'd try something new for once." He sighed and eased himself into the opposite chair.

She understood. She had danced, and they had finally sent her to make headlines in Paris, Tokyo, New York, and many others, and let her choreograph. She had retired, and she'd done this and that – more choreography, teaching, judging competitions. Years ago, figure skating had bored her, and she'd left Yakov for Moscow; then the atmosphere at the Bolshoi had frustrated her, and she'd hankered for something new again.

Yakov had coached.

He had made some noise about retiring after the Olympic season. But then little Yuri had crashed out towards the end of it, and there was no way Yakov or Lilia was going to leave him quite yet. He needed their guidance to finish learning from the experience and rebuild himself as his body finished growing, before they left him to other coaches. Despite that, there might be time for Yakov to explore.

She stood when the water was boiling to make the tea, and while she was at the counter, she cut two apples to go with it. "While Yura will no doubt keep us busy," she said, sitting down and offering Yakov his plate, "I have an interesting choreography opportunity this winter. 'Ballet on ice', I believe they're trying to bill it as."

Yakov hid his snort in his cup. "It's not _Nutcracker_ like they do every year in Moscow, is it? No, it can't be. You'd never take the job."

She'd grown tired of _The Nutcracker_ decades ago, and Yakov knew it. "No. _Swan Lake,_ if I can figure out how to make cygnets dance on skates." She watched Yakov pick up one of the apple slices, distracted by the movement of his fingers. "Perhaps what I need is a skating consultant."

Lilia had never learned to skate, but she had learned a lot about skating over the years – she could name the different spirals, the different spin positions, could tell a rocker turn apart from a mohawk, though some of the more similar steps still confused her. Yakov had always been needed to put the finishing touches on the programs, however, and to make sure everything was in order for whatever the rules were that year.

"The ballerina who advised the skating now needs the skater to advise the ballet," he said, and he had a thoughtful look as he crunched on the apple. "Why not?" he finally said. "It would be different." He cleared his throat and laid his hand over hers on the table. "I do enjoy working with you."

Lilia looked at their hands and thought of how yes, she enjoyed working with him, too. Of the small touches that had slowly become more common over the past two years, pats on the shoulder, hands on knees, simple close contact. Of her dishes neatly lined up in the cupboard and the peace they'd both managed to reforge in the evenings. Of Yakov's expression when he had skated earlier.

She did not believe in clinging to the past. She didn't believe in throwing it all away for the sake of throwing it away, either.

His mouth tasted sweet, like the apples, and they let the tea grow cold.


End file.
